Immigration and Customs Enforcement is losing employees faster than at any point in its history, with thousands of recent hires quitting or getting fired shortly after joining, according to federal workforce data.
According to the Washington Examiner, roughly 2,900 officers walked out the door in the first six months of 2026 alone, a total that tops any entire year on record, going back to 2012 when the government started counting. Voluntary resignations and firings accounted for most of the exits rather than retirements.
The churn follows an enormous and chaotic hiring push. After more than 200,000 people applied, the Trump administration added close to 12,000 full-time ICE workers from the start of 2025 through June 2026, a figure that exceeds everything the agency hired in the ten years before. Experts told USA Today the pace outstripped the agency’s ability to vet and train recruits, a risky gap as agents spend more time dealing directly with the public in situations that can escalate violently.
The mix of departures has shifted sharply. Firings barely registered in 2024, making up under 1 percent of exits, but now account for 18 percent, and Arsenal PAC reports the people being let go typically lasted less than four months on the job. Quitting has surged too, going from about one in seven departures to more than half.
One veteran officer, speaking anonymously to the Washington Examiner, blamed many of the firings on recruits who made bad calls in the field or later flunked their federal background checks.
“It’s like almost every week people are being fired due to failed backgrounds,” the officer said.
NewsNation reported ICE had about 29,000 employees in July, roughly 8,000 more than when Trump took office, and that a former official said several trainees were dismissed after the agency learned they had open arrest warrants.
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